great drive-thru confrontations of our times

Breaking News: A Liberal Acted Like A Total Jerk

So, this guy. Drivin’ up in his Prius, bursting with joy and righteousness about his purpose-driven life of haughtily lecturing minimum wage workers who should be ashamed of themselves for daring to have a job at a place that gives corporate donations dude does not agree with. And then, at the end, explaining to the calm pretty redhead, who manages to keep her pleasant demeanor throughout his harangue, don’t worry, it’s not like he’s a fag. Yeah, he’d totally let her give him a handy. (You know he was thinking it.)

Anyway, dude got fired from his job for going around treating people like shit. Sucks, dude. Maybe be nicer.

Say, aren't this guy's First Amendment rights being violated? He was fired for voicing an opinion. Where's Sarah Palin? Mike Huckabee? Rick Santorum?

Texan_Bulldog

Stuffing their gobs at Chick-Fil-A.

Guppy

The first amendment guarantees you the right to voice your opinion, so long as your opinion agrees with your employer's.

tessiee

The guy who got fired may be a douche, but the guy who fired him issued a statement about how much their company values freedom of speech and diversity of opinion, and then fired his ass.

Lazy Media

That's not what your First Amendment rights are. The government can't use prior restraint to stop you from speaking. That's it. If you say something objectionable, it can have consequences, from prosecution (for shouting fire in a theater) to a libel suit.

Unless this smug prick had a "right to blatant douchebaggery" clause in his CEO contract, the company can fire him for just about any reason. It's not like he's a wage worker who comes under the Fair Labor Practices Act.

We have a new gag around here, when the India calls come asking us to switch our electric power supplier. They call my business # which is at home – and ask to speak to the person "in charge". I hand the phone to my kids who end up tying them up for 20-30 minutes passing the phone back and forth as they make up accents pretending to be confused and needing to put a higher level boss on the line.

emmelemm

That's sheer fucking brilliance, right there.

tessiee

*sings*
"Well it's bad, bad, johnnyzhivago,
Baddest man in all of Chicago,
Badder than Doktorzoom,
and meaner than a BigSkullfuckingDog"

BigSkullF*ckingDog

glad to know my reputation is intact.

Lascauxcaveman

I've done the thing where I pretend to be sort of interested in whatever their selling, then try to steer the conversation around to "Hey, you sound kind of cute, ummm… you want to maybe meet for for coffee or something, sometime?"

Estproph

So James O'Keefe has a brother. Who knew?

One_who_wanders

Dicks come in all flavors, or so I have heard.

kittensdontlie

I am not gay and I have heard that also. Did I mention that I don't believe I am gay…ok then.

In the States we leave it up to the parents to decide if their children should be told about Canada’s existence. In my 18 years of formal education Canada never came up even conversationally. Anyhoo didn’t England pressing our sailors start the kerfuffle?

Guppy

Yeah, it was the British insisting that they own all people born in Ireland, always and forever.

emmelemm

Well, I learned all about Canada in school, but that's only because I live in a state that borders our nation's hat, and back in the 80s, Canadian money was cheap enough that it was worth it to drive up there.

anniegetyerfun

I remember that! Shopping in Canada was such a treat.

viennawoods13

Ahem. If you read the speeches by the war hawks in the Senate, you will find that the real reason for the war was that they wanted to get their grimy paws on southwestern Ontario. Over my ancestors's dead bodies, dammit!

Beowoof

I grew up in Niagara Falls NY, we used to ride our bikes to Canada. Swimming at Dufferin Islands park and smuggling home firecrackers for the 4th. A dime and we could go over the Rainbow Bridge. Lots of good times, in very cool and well done parks. Also, lots of sneaking into museums. Who knew that walking backwards would work to get you into Madam Tussaud's wax museum.

Beowoof

We could yell at them because the the Maple Leafs suck, and Tim used to play for the Leafs. Makes as much sense as this guy bugging this girl for where she works. Oh and from our conversation the other day Tim's coffee is roasted in Rochester.

Goonemeritus

Is it really, where?

Beowoof

Mushroom Blvd in Henrietta. Which is a little industrial park, behind Home Depot on Jefferson.

Goonemeritus

Cool

glasspusher

How close is that to the Great, Great House of Guitars?

Goonemeritus

3 miles from where I work

glasspusher

I went to RIT 29 years ago, my one failed year of college (I had many successful ones after that, though). Loved the commercials. I hope they're still going. How is Rochester? I'm bummed about Kodak. Considering I was in Imaging and Photographic Science at RIT, perhaps the switch in majors I did after that was not a bad thing…

Goonemeritus

On the whole Rochester is doing well; the bigger companies that it banked on have been in decline for 25 years. The good news is that many people that left the big three started small businesses that continue to this day. Overall unemployment has been running 2% under the national average, housing prices are stable and the government which is split between Republican and Democrats is functional. The art scene and quality of life is great.

glasspusher

Good to hear! I liked it when I was there. I love snow…went to grad school in Cleveland, similar weather

Beowoof

About 15 miles on 590. House of Guitars is always an interesting place to poke around. Went last Christmas to get my brother-in-law the bass player a shirt to wear around in Vegas.

An_Outhouse

Holy fuck! I didn't realize so many wonketeers live in WNY. Cool.

anniegetyerfun

I feel like yelling at them for having a team with the word "leafs" in the name.

tessiee

I feel the same way about "Carl's, Jr." Also, what's up with Gilbey's Gin? Shouldn't it be either Gilbey's Gin or Jilbey's Jin?

viennawoods13

Well, to be fair, we just call them the "Make You Laffs", anyway.

viennawoods13

Go Habs.

viennawoods13

That might explain why the coffee SUCKS.

Beowoof

Extra creme always makes it passable, and they have pretty good sausage biscuits in the morning.

I thought so, too. A little self-righteous, and a little too proud of himself for costing the corporation the $0.003 cents it cost them to make that cup and fill it with tap water, but, having been on the other side of the window from a customer (patient) intent on berating me for something that has nothing to do with me, I've seen way, way worse.

memzilla

Of course, this guy sees no irony in his driving a Japanese car with components manufactured by the exact same corporation which manufactured the Mitsubishi A6M2 Zero, which attacked Pearl Harbor.

Billmatic

Well it's probably built here in the country, as opposed to anything made by an American company.

An_Outhouse

traitor

BaldarTFlagass

Or as one of my xenophobic right-wing college professors called them (and all Nipponese cars), "Japanese Beetles."

emmelemm

A friend of mine and I were talking about our WWII-Pacific Theater-serving grandfathers, and how they were both generally racist (all around), but particularly hated Japanese people, and ranted constantly about Japanese cars.

As she pointed out, her gf would rant about Japanese cars, but saw no problem buying a Mercedes or BMW. (My grandfather was never rich enough to buy a Mercedes or BMW anyway.)

I reckon the students who might be sitting in raped him and took a shit on his car. At least, that's what Breitbart said they'd do.

b[redact]opple

I'm in favor of committing hate-crimes against Prius owners, for all sorts of reasons.

Also, too, that "I'm totally heterosexual" line is my favorite. You hear it all the time — " I'm totally for gay marriage for my gay friends, but just want to make this disclaimer so nobody gets the wrong idea, ha ha." yeah, fuck you.

One_who_wanders

And it's that nervous Heh – heh kinda laugh. That makes you doubt everything he is saying.

Beowoof

Yes, the I'm not gay, I just like to suck cock defense. Defending the gays and then stigmatizing them in the same effort. What a douche bag.

mookwrthwilson

Well that's 1…but we definitely have some serious catching up to do in the "Acting Like a Jerk" category…

This is sort of what I have against protesting or boycotting franchise places. You're made at the corporation. The person who owns the franchise or works there has no say in the corporation owner's opinions. The locals may actually agree with YOU. But, the locals have to take the brunt of the actions that were meant for the corporate guy. Doesn't seem fair.

proudgrampa

You're absolutely right. Franchisees are at the bottom of the food chain, so to speak, and quite often are at odds with their corporate masters.

From where I stand, that looks like a thoroughly toxic corporate culture that does translate to franchise-level problems. Which, together with the issue of corporate profits financing hate campaigns, certainly justifies a boycott in my book. Being a dick to individual employees, though? Not so much.

Terry

I'm not defending ChikFilA, although I have to admit to having eaten a few of their (delicious) sandwiches when I lived down south. I was speaking more in general.

The boycott would also serve to discourage potential franchisees from buying one of those joints, no?

bobbert

Boycotting anything is always tricky. It is all but guaranteed that there will be unexpected side-effects. But what can you do? There is no way to selectively boycott corporate HQ.

The local franchise owner must be aware of the corporate owner's opinions (they tend to promulgate them). Whether or not the franchisee agrees with the corporate POV, if he/she does not take visible action to oppose it, it's the same as agreeing. To a compliant franchisee, I'd say "You've tied yourself to the corporate brand, so you get to share the brand's ups and downs".

Now, it's also true that the point of a boycott is to encourage a global change in behavior. If it turns out that you can only generate an effective boycott at the extremities of the corporate footprint, there is probably no point in continuing. This may be the case with ChickenFuckinA.

not even my ex husband the cleveland indians fan was this much of a tool.

tessiee

We *all* know this guy.
Some of us have even dated him.

Callyson

Oh, fuck this guy. I worked one summer at a Carl's Jr, whose founder was an anti choice fundie–I got out of that job a little while after I heard about that but it took a little time to hook up with another job, and I would not have appreciated having a customer like this to deal with in the meantime.

Excuse the repost from the other thread, but that makes me think there was something suspicious going on.
The fact that he was a CFO suggests that he could beat up "some minimum wage nobody" with a baseball bat and not get fired — provided he kept shoveling in the money for his company.

Nibbler of Niblonia

customers give feedback to employees. employees tell their shift manager. the manager tells the franchise operator. the franchise operator tells the regional manager. the regional manager tells their corporate boss. the corporate boss tells the CEO and the board.

Although prius guy was kind of inarticulate and douchey about it, people have every right to go to a Chick-fil-A as a customer and say, "please tell your boss's boss's boss's boss that I think they should reconsider things before it affects business, e.g. I won't shop here anymore."

SheriffRoscoe

I'd wager that this particular display of dissatisfaction with the corporate culture directed at a front-line employee in uniform and first-name-only name badge, was as ineffective as it was douchey.

HistoriCat

Probably more like "employees tell their shift manager, who doesn't want to hear about it because the people above him are assholes who don't give a shit what the little people think and besides, they're falling behind on orders."

BigSkullF*ckingDog

This, exactly. On a day-to-day basis this is how most corporations operate. Communication works its way downstream MUCH faster than upstream. Especially when dealing with minimum wage workers.

tessiee

I remember reading somewhere that the guy who worked in some drugstore (not Walgreen's, I don't think) was required to ask "may I help you?" repeatedly (which does sound kind of annoying). He thought it was stupid, so he didn't do it, and the manager put a reprimand in his personnel record. So he did it, and sure enough, the customers got annoyed and left the store. The third or fourth time this happened, he turned around to his manager, who had seen the whole thing, and asked, "Why are you requiring me to say and do something that *makes customers leave the store*?" His manager shrugged and said something like, "whattya want from me? the corporate office says we have to do it."

This makes me think that upper management is not receptive to customer feedback.

Callyson

Also–OK, how many of the straight male Wonketteers or gay female Wonketteers want to do the nice cashier?

I'm going with AOTK…

MissTaken

I'd do her

and I'm a nice girl by the way, and I'm totally heterosexual.

SorosBot

You're trying to turn all of Wonkette on again, aren't you?

Tundra Grifter

We'lll look for you two at today's Kiss In.

Blueb4sinrise

Welllllllllllllllllllllllllll…………

pdiddycornchips

Slightly OT but how the fuck is Chick a Fil the dominant story this week? Someone is making a shitload of bank off this little trip down the rabbit hole.

Fuck Chick a Fil, fuck their owners, fuck this douchebag, fuck the media for saying "Chick a Fil" on TV 400,000,000,000 times this week, fuck the chickens too.

ElPinche

Keep fuckin that breaded chicken.

Yeah, never gave a shit about diabetes factory. This reminds me a Bill Hicks rant on marketing. They're going for the "righteous indignation dollar" and the "anger dollar."

OneYieldRegular

With that kind of talk, you are going to make it very difficult for Chick-Fil-A to open a franchise in Syria once whatever might be happening there calms down.

Advn2rgirl

Are we talking about Mitt's tax returns?

Also, how does the Kiss-In and the attendant free advertising hurt the company's bottom line, again?

Billmatic

Do you not have facebook?

hollywooddood

I wish some of my co-workers would get fired for being jerks.

tessiee

I wish some members of Congress would get fired for being jerks.

Not_So_Much

Yes Adam, the (probably) single mom working three sub-minimum wage jobs is exactly the right person to go after, you fucking douchecanoe..

It's like ranting to an employee of a fast-food franchise restaurant because of what the CEO of the company said……wait .

RadioBowels

I call bullshit.

Tundra Grifter

So, apparently, did Mr. Smith's boss.

Tundra Grifter

I hope these nice women get just as much play as that jerk:

After hundreds of thousands of people ate dinner at his restaurants on Wednesday for Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day, one Georgia family, a same-sex couple and their two daughters, has invited Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy to have dinner at their house.
"I hope Mr. Cathy will join my family for dinner, where we can share a respectful dialogue about our faith, work and families here in Georgia," Alt said in a statement. "It's important that Mr. Cathy meet the people his company is donating millions to stand against."
"I'll even make chicken," Alt added.
…
"Without question, Dan Cathy has every right to voice his opinions and beliefs," Graddick said in a statement. "But he should meet and get to know the people that he's speaking out against – the people who are harmed by his company's multi-million dollar donations to anti-gay hate groups working to hurt everyday LGBT Americans and break apart loving families."http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/08/same…

Nostrildamus

"I'll even make chicken," Alt added.

I doubt if Dan Cathy can stand to even look at a chicken any more.

Tundra Grifter

I don't know about that. Remember in "Super Size Me" they interviewed the ice cream heir? His Father and his uncle both died of heart attacks. Too much ice cream…

TavariousChinaSmith

Sorry, Dr. Grifter. There is no such thing as "too much ice cream."

elviouslyqueer

For the love of all that is good in this world, DO NOT read the comments on that link.

SorosBot

"Do not read the comments" is generally good advice for any mainstream media article; they really seem to have a knack for attracting the crazies.

CK: Here on the Internets the rude and nasty have a million Fathers and Mothers; the nice folks appear to always be orphans.

tessiee

Mr. Cathy would go over their house, and while sitting at their table eating their food, spend the entire dinner hour "explaining" to them that they're evil, abnormal, disgusting queers that God hates. Then he'd conclude that The Geigh is even more powerful and scary than he previously feared, since it's even corrupted these nice ladies, and redouble his contributions to the KKK or whatever the fuck hate organizations he's bankrolling

MozakiBlocks

Kinda of a bitchass move there Adam. If you didn't want her to work for Chick-fil-A, you could have offered her a job at your company. Well before you got fired.

Tundra Grifter

On the plus side, now she can put in a good word for him at Chick-fil-A.

An_Outhouse

I hate fat asses who wait in line for tens of minutes in their car for shit. Park, and at least get some exercise waddling into and out of the store.

BaldarTFlagass

There's one in every crowd.

Soylent Green

Prius's are always going to be rolling vaginas.

karlamarx

with that attitude dear soylent green we shall never make any head way against carbon based global warming. until the LOOKS of a car are less important than how it runs is more important to people like you, we shall die like frogs in a slowly heating pot of water, unconscious of our end. yeah. drive a mustang. it's really cool, dude. no. no a HUMMER. oh, wait. they're no longer the cool vehicle. everything we buy is a vote for how we want the world to be.
you guys are my FAVORITE commenters in all of blogland and i am non-plussed in having to speak truth to your power, but . . . that is my job.
that poor guy was filled with zeal, acted on his principles, gave the woman in the window some sound advice and you guys have made him out to be a jerk.
i am sad about this. you can do better.

Soylent Green

Correction: I drive a smart car (true) and even I think Prius's are rolling vaginas.

Exhausted66

Guy In Prius Scores a Free Giant Styrofoam Cup.

Good work, dude.

proudgrampa

This was not cool.

And I don't care what he says, if he drives a Prius, he's fucking gay.

i worked in minimum wage too and the guy was RIGHT. she was not right. she was just pleasant. and i have plenty of rage at the whole fucking system. i'll bet you a MILLION DOLLARS she is not voting. or if she is, it's a republican vote.
because she does NOT PAY ATTENTION to the issues. he got inside her protected armor and maybe made a difference.
but i love you jerri. we are sisters. stay angry!

he didn't take it out on her. he just pointed out that she was working for an asshole. since when is that wrong?
and didn't you see her buddy behind her smirking while she kept a straight (excuse the pun) face?
i love that guy.

Thunderclees

he just pointed out that she was working for an asshole.

Did you miss the part around 1:50 when Mr. Smith asks the woman working a job at the f*ckin' drive-thru, "I don't know how you live with yourself?" I'm sure when she was a young girl, this was her dream: to work for minimum wage for a company that suddenly found itself at the center of a culture war shitstorm.

He went far beyond pointing out that she was working for an asshole. She's not her company's spokesman, but by presenting himself as a disgruntled customer at the point-of-sale, he places that onus on her, and he does it all to have some lulz on the internet.

and didn't you see her buddy behind her smirking while she kept a straight (excuse the pun) face?

Mr. Smith was more than welcome to direct his comments to someone other than the woman who did an admirable job of giving him his free water, and then serving as his punching bag. I have no sympathy for a guy who's ends may be just but whose means are just dickish.

That's right, guy named Adam! Stick it to Dan Cathy, $0.003 at a time!

I mean, granted, if you hadn't done this, you could have kept your job, and then maybe donated a few thousand dollars to an activist group aimed at counteracting Dan Cathy's crap in a way that isn't completely counterproductive, but on the other hand, if you did things that way, you wouldn't have had the chance to berate a random fast food employee. So good job!

BigSkullF*ckingDog

This just proves that 99% of douchebags are conservative.

He is the 1%!!!!

Guppy

Don't give him so much credit. His "I'm totally not gay" spiel at the end? He was doing this to get tail, period.

Puffperney

Dickishness can be found on both ends of the spectrum.

BaldarTFlagass

Assholiness doesn't have a specific political leaning; although it does trend towards the right, this guy is an obvious outlier.

Puffperney

Agreed. Big list to starboard on the SS Assholiness!

OneYieldRegular

Doesn't anyone at Wonkette have a job opening? Someone who behaves that professionally while working for minimum wage in a drive-through window at a fast food joint should be given a reprieve from working at a place where all the customers now are total jerks.

At the very least: Dan Cathy, since you're now in need of a new PR exec, here's your candidate.

tessiee

"working at a place where all the customers now are total jerks"

Because only some of US are total jerks?

ElPinche

You know there's a marketing hell spawn cackling right now.

An_Outhouse

I once chaperoned a high school class to visit NYC. We stopped at a burger king/McDonalds in Jersey – a whole bus load right at noon. All the people who worked there were just like that lady – awesome and professional. The bus driver warned us about hanging around outside because it was a 'shady' neighborhood. Fuck you, fat white bus driver. Not every person of color is here to slit your throat.

Used to watch this every Thanksgiving too, because traveling to see family still in NJ is like taking part in a great salmon spawning run full of people. Nightmarish at times.

I think you're right about WKRP. She played bit parts in a lot of comedies and she may have been a Second City Alum, too

Tundra Grifter

Speaking of Christmas movies, there is a wonderful cameo by the late, great John Candy in "Home Alone." What a sweet guy.

tessiee

Chris Meloni is all KINDS of awesome!

C_R_Eature

For a bit part in a weird movie, he really threw everything he has into it. I hear he did yeoman's work in that HBO Vampire thing too. I don't know directly because a) no HBO and b) excruciatingly tired of Vampires. Zombies, also.

I don't know. She wouldn't have that button if she wasn't one of the big wigs. Because that's how franchises work!

Lazy Media

So, after a long bout of Internet research, I have determined the "Chick-Fil-A gives millions to hate groups" meme is not true. Chick-Fil-A's Winshape Foundation gave about $20,000 to blatant anti-gay hate groups in 2010, while giving about $2 million to neutral-to-positive religious charities like the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. And spent another $3 million on their own do-gooder programs that have nothing to do with being anti-gay. That's based on reading Equality Matters' press release that claimed the whole $2 million went to bad people, mainly justified by guilt-by-association.

So, considering Chick-Fil-A isn't blatantly discriminatory against gay employees or customers, and their charitable giving is less than 1 percent evil, I have determined I can still buy their mediocre food with a good conscience. Your conclusion may very.

karlamarx

first of all, priuses are great and we should all be driving one or another of that kind of car. i am sick of people saying we prius owners are self-righteous snobs. we are trying to save the world, for god's sake. jeeeeeeezus.
second, the guy was not a jerk. he was right in describing the corporate mind set of chic fil A, which IS hate-filled AND serves crap to its customers, AND pays their employees minimum wage. double jeeeeeeezus.
and third how come he got fired for speaking his mind? he was only trying to do the right thing. he even told her to speak truth to power, which in my book is very important.
fourth, the server didn't have a clue as to the civil rights issue involved. being so uninformed means she doesn't care or she watches "Jerseylicious" or something. consequently she decided to parrot her boss's party line. there is no excuse for not being an informed person in this day and age. you have to REALLY try hard to not be up on what's going on in the world.
but driver boy is not totally blameless. he should have said something about the styrofoam drinking vessel he took.
not with you on this one, dear editrix.
but i love you.

not that Dewey

"Both sides do it!"

-every amoral tv news or WaPo personality, ever

fishwharf

I hope the Chick-Fil-A management give this young lady a nice big raise, up to at least a living wage.

karlamarx

ME, TOO. but it won't be because she's spoken out about it. i wonder if she'd ever carry a picket sign and walk the walk.
yeah. right.

ttommyunger

The age of the inter-toobes is really catapulting the stupid right in our faces. Ugh!